Woman`s Suit Against Hospital Reaches Jury 7 Years After Rape

January 14, 1986|By Patricia Elich, Staff Writer

A 35-year-old woman, raped in 1978, waited four years before filing a last- minute lawsuit in 1982 against the hospital where she was attacked. Later this week, a Broward Circuit Court jury will tell her whether she should have bothered at all.

The woman, employed at the time by a courier service, was abducted by Jesse James Hill as she left the AMI Northridge Hospital in Oakland Park on Nov. 3, 1978, according to testimony.

The woman was approached by Hill as she was walking back to her van, which was parked just outside the emergency entrance to the hospital, according to testimony. Hill made her drive to a secluded area three miles away and assaulted her.

He later pleaded guilty to sexual assault and abduction and spent five years in prison, according to court records and statements from the plaintiff`s attorneys.

On Monday, seven years after the attack, attorneys for the woman appeared before Broward Circuit Judge Herbert Moriarity at the opening day of trial to contend that Northridge did not provide adequate security to the woman when she arrived to deliver radiology supplies in the pre-dawn darkness.

The hospital`s attorney, Tom Graham, however, argued that the hospital`s security force was established to protect only employees and visitors to the hospital, not ``commercial delivery people, police officers, firefighters, ambulance drivers or anyone else coming to the hospital.``

Larry Wren, attorney for the plaintiff, said the woman, whose identity is being withheld because she was the victim of a sexual assault, has been irreparably harmed by the attack. She now cleans houses so she will not have to see people, he said. Her personal life also has been damaged, he added.

``She was involved with a gentleman before the attack,`` Wren said. ``They had discussed marriage and having a family. She has since been unable to have any relationship with men.``

Wren has not yet told the jury how much money he wants for his client.